Thursday, April 12

fred langford edwards.

Magic, medicine, dried monkeys - it all comes under one roof in the work of Fred Langford Edwards, a talented photographer with a consumptive curiosity for relics of our natural historical past. These images came from his 2007 exhibition Alfred Russel Wallace: The Forgotten Evolutionist, an homage to the life of the 19th century collector and man who almost beat Darwin to it. Edwards spend 30 months traipsing Wallaces' old routes through the Malay Archipelago and the Amazon Basin, capturing antique specimens and the stunning natural environment with equal aplomb.

His current exhibition - Apothecaries, Archives, Icons at the Mostyn gallery in London - brings together a myriad of photographs taken during his four year stint working in an Ecuadorian museum of medical curiosities.

What strange and lovely little things these images are - part distasteful and part hypnotic, bubbly brewing butterflies and obsolete potions that makes us glad for Paracetamol. Always a joy to see an artist with a taste for adventure and a skillful lens, reminding us that the science world's puzzling visual intrigue proves an eternally tantalizing offering.